Sketches for My Sweetheart
by lereveetlamour
Summary: Sketches on the minor characters, the ones that never had their stories told. This is how they survived or didn't.
1. Twins

**A/N: I wanted to write a couple of short vignettes on just how the Hunger Games influences people. Enjoy and review!**

**I don't own the Hunger Games trilogy or its characters.**

**By the way, if you recognize the title, you are awesome. If not, its Jeff Buckley, who is AMAZING.**

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><p>Matilda Donner<p>

She comes home in a cheap pale casket, sealed. The only thing that distinguishes hers from the other two that are dumped on the platform for District 12 is her name, printed boldly on the side. A large Capitol seal is stamped on the top. I run away when Ruth's hand searches for mine.

Beautiful Maysilee, now scarred and mutilated. She didn't deserve this. She was always the better one.

At home I break all the mirrors. I'm loud and destructive, a ticking bomb. My parents never stop me. They're glad for one less reminder of her. In some ways, they have it worse. Thankfully, I only see her now when I close my eyes and in my night terrors. They see her every time they look at me, in everything I do, in everything I say and don't say.

At her burial, I stand with Ruth and let her hold onto my mess of a hand. She cries into my shoulder. Once, she calls me her name by mistake. But it's not until the flock of birds fly over her body for the last time when I lose it. I envy Haymitch because everyone understands his absence, sympathizes with the fact that he stays locked away in his new house. When the first patch of dirt is thrown on her coffin, I realize that I'm no longer a twin.


	2. Cookies

**A/N: I've always had a thing for minor characters. **

**I don't own the Hunger Games, its subsequent sequels, or its characters, sadly.**

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><p><strong>Durham Mellark<strong>

My first sight of her is one of vulnerability. The girl with her face buried in the rich velvet of the plush pillows, breathing deep and slow, is so unlike the unmoving, distant one that I had seen just a few minutes earlier, the one we had saluted goodbye to, a rare act for the people of District 12, an even rarer act on such a public day as today.

I can see her confusion when she looks up at me, her face knotted, lips slightly pursed. It is clear that Katniss is her father's child. She has his dark hair, his sharp eyes, and his fight. But there are small glimpses of Ruth in her too, in the small circles she draws with her fingers, the way she tilts her head, the soft curve of her lips. It's all there and it painfully reminds me of the young girl I had known in my own youth, reserved, but brimming with life.

I hand over a package of cookies and sit in silence; there's nothing left to say. When I leave I tell her that her little sister will be taken care of. It's the least I can do to ease the guilt I feel. In the final moments, I study her, remembering her. Remembering her mother too, because it's different this time around. I love my son. And after the Games, when the train pulls up with the Victor, it's not her that I want to see.


	3. Mockingjay

**A/N: My unending quest to give a voice to all the voiceless, I guess. Tell me what you think. **

**I don't own the Hunger Games or its characters. **

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><p><strong>Pollux Gemin<strong>

I've never seen a real mockingjay before. There aren't any in the Capitol. Watching it hop branch to branch and stretch its wings, it makes perfect sense why we chose this bird as the symbol of the rebellion, of new life. The ruins of District 12 lay sprawled out across my vision, but here, underneath the shade of the large oak, I know I've never seen anything as free and content. Or safe. And isn't that why we're here?

Back home, I panicked every day I woke up to the dirt ceiling. For five years, I didn't see the sun. It never got better with time. If anything, it got worse. My equally silent companions and I, we nudged and prodded at each other and drew on the ground, anything to keep from going mad. There were plenty that did go mad. They pulled at their hair and made horrible agonizing moans. Till the day I die, I'm certain I will never hear a worse sound.

With a twig, I write _SING _on the ground because that's what I've always done. And Katniss does sing, a tragic song about a dead man. All the mockingjays fall silent and listen respectfully to one of their own. She is free, and content, and safe. I understand a little better now, the ones underground that moaned in desperation. They needed to know that there was something left, something the Capitol couldn't just cut away. So I will fight for them and for myself, to prove that there are still things worth fighting for. I will fight until, one day, I won't have to anymore.


	4. White Dress

**A/N: This is dedicated to ****_Les random person_ who wanted a sketch of Portia. I love Portia and thought it was tragic there was only a few sentences on her and what happened to her in Mockinjay. I hope I did it justice.**

**I don't own the Hunger Games, its sequels, or its characters. **

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><p><strong>Portia Lewin<strong>

I met him in a white dress with large curved wings that shone like the sun. If my mother had taught me anything it was that life was like a ladder and everyone had to climb it, rung by rung, to reach the top. This was the next rung. The first thing Cinna did, the first time his agile fingers touched me, was to take off my wings. He said I didn't need it, lovelier without, actually.

It left me feeling naked and exposed. Yet, for some reason, it made perfect sense standing there before him in a simple knee-length dress. He wore black slacks and a grey button-up. He was naked too, but didn't seem to mind the curious stares. I decided that I didn't need to, either. And it felt like a beginning.

They let us choose what we wanted to wear for the broadcast. A final wish. We all knew it was so everyone would recognize us. I chose my white dress because it would show the blood stains well, a reminder forever of what they did to us and because Cinna had thought me lovely in it.

Life, as it turns out, is more of a circle. The beginning and end blur together until no one can be sure which is which. Really, it doesn't matter. The belief is enough. I smooth out the front of the dress that marks my beginning and end and walk out to the center of the stage, to meet Cinna again.


	5. Redemption

**A/N: My first tribute. Won't be my last, though. Feel free to make suggestions on who I should write next. And review, please! **

**I do not own the Hunger Games or its characters**

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><p><strong>Glimmer Orrick<strong>

My cousin, Dagda, volunteered when I was fourteen. He was handsome and strong, the perfect image of a Victor. My father patted him fondly on the back and my grandmother winked knowingly at the cameras that have always loved her. She is a legend, the first of several Orricks to move to the Victor's Village.

When the dam broke and the mad girl won, my family turned off our television and closed the blinds. They mourned, not for him, but for lost opportunities. My mother gave a bitter laugh when I cried. On a humid summer morning, Dagda was buried without ceremony or honor. I was given the only remaining vestige of him: a small gemstone that came back with his body.

I turned eighteen two weeks before my last Reaping. My parents never hid their impatience; they had been waiting on me for more than three years. This was my last chance to bring respect back to the Orricks. Redemption. They didn't know, couldn't know, that I was relieved this was my final year before I moved behind the rope, that every time I watch the Games, I am reminded of Dagda, of the disgraceful way he was forgotten; no one ever remembers a drowned boy.

When my name is called, no one volunteers. I am an Orrick, after all. The only thing I can take with me is my surname. And a spike dipped in pokewood juice, hidden in Dagda's gemstone. I will not be forgotten. I will be eternal.


	6. Watching eyes

**A/N: I can't believe there are so few stories about Titus out there. He's such an intriguing character. I wanted to give him more humanity. I think he was pushed to do the things he did, not because he wanted to. Anyways, hope you like it. Please tell ****me what you think. Suggestions are welcome. ****Shoutout to chuckesleaze for this suggestion. **

**I do not own the Hunger Games or its characters.**

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><p><strong>Titus Cruor<strong>

The first was a mistake. I didn't want to eat the girl from District 9, but she died too close and I couldn't risk leaving the food, not when the hovercraft was coming. Her body had been ravaged by the mutts and I couldn't tell the difference. Everything was red. So I shut my eyes and ate. I didn't know for sure until they sent the storm at me.

This year, there is nothing but white in the arena. It is a barren cold desert and we are all hungry. The only differences are that the others are too noble, too proud (too human?). It is shameful, but I am stranded. No silver parachutes every come. I never expect them to, not after the first.

The girl from District 5 had extra meat; her body had a nice curve, soft elbows and calves. The large boy from District 3, though, was hard and muscled. His skin was gritty and his eyes were still open, watching me, always watching. I try not think of his family.

On the 7th day, I find Talia's frozen curled-up body, half-buried in the snow. She had tried to set a fire. I remember her silent determination, her small balled-up fists. I build a makeshift grave from handfuls of snow, dig until I can hide her away from all the watching eyes. When I take my first bite, I am not filled with the gnawing of hunger like before. I want her courage. I finish her guts before my body tenses up, shaking, and I fall down next to her. But, I am satisfied. That is one thing they will never be able to take from that little girl.


	7. Red Welts

**A/N: I always liked Cecelia and the fact that she had kids and didn't turn to morphling or spirits. Review and tell me what you think. **

**I don't own the Hunger Games or its characters**

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><p><strong>Cecelia Sirett<strong>

I won the 60th Games by strangling a girl with my bare hands. My fingers stayed locked around her neck long after she stopped weakly scratching at my face, after the life left her body, and after my name was announced, the word 'victor' now forever attached. I didn't let go until the ladder dropped, and then, it was only to switch my iron grip to the nearest rung. I had to make sure she was dead, that she wouldn't wake up and make me stay there.

It wasn't fair. I didn't deserve happiness. I didn't deserve a new house that smelled of potato soup and warm briskets, and felt like home. I didn't deserve Peter, the loving man that lit the lavender candles on our wedding day and told me that he would never let me go. I didn't deserve my three kids. When I first held Edger in my trembling arms, for a blissful moment, I forgot about the nightmares, and the arena, and the girl with the red welts around her neck. And when Tobias and then Francis joined, and the three boys chased each other down the hallways, giggling and red-faced, I felt more than happy; I was whole again.

It isn't fair, but it's coping, surviving. It's cooking breakfast in the morning and reading bedtime stories at night. It's selfishly blocking out horrifying memories. And maybe we all deserve some happiness in this concrete and smoke, even me. That's what I have to tell myself when Edger comes home from school with shining eyes and asks me why I strangled a girl that had said, so shyly, during her pre-Games interview that she wanted a family of her own one day.


	8. Colors

**A/N: I guess I should include a warning that this one has drug use, but it's a bit laughable because I've already had one about a guy that ate people. I'll let you decide which is worse. Please review and tell me what you like or don't like, it only takes a few seconds and it helps me as the writer tremendously. **

**I don't own the Hunger Games or its characters.**

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><p><strong>Foster Jobes<strong>

Dory shows up on my doorsteps, tears carving out her already hollowed cheeks, crying about the nightmares. I know them well, but Dory, who just won her Games a mere four weeks ago, is new to this, new to the fears and agonies that come with realizing blood never truly washes off a Victor's hands.

I decide to let her in on my secret, my method of coping. I hand her a syringe and show her the perfect spot on the arm, how to angle the needle so that the morphling shoots directly into the bloodstream. Her fingers are all nerves. She misses the first time, but tries again and sighs in relief as she pushes the plunger down, emptying the clear liquid from the tube.

We lie side by side and watch the patterns on the ceiling shift around and morph into pretty pictures. I hold up a finger and stumble up the stairs to grab my paints. Together, we paint my living room. Blue blobs trail along the floor. A green shooting star streaks across the wall and the back of my couch. Red handprints are everywhere, but this time it doesn't make me run to the sink, scrub my hands until they're raw.

We collapse onto the floor, panting. The colors comfort me, wrapping their dancing arms around us both and refusing to ease an inch. It is beautiful and right. She hums a little tune while her hands guide the colors.

I've been a mentor for five years, lost nine tributes before her, seen so many horrors. But having her here, lying next to me, humming and smiling, it almost makes up for it.


	9. Pretty Things

**A/N: So this is a sketch of Haymitch's gal. I try and keep each character to about 270 words or so and this one was by far the hardest to edit down because I just wanted to keep writing young Haymitch. I think I'll add teenage Haymitch to the list of oneshots that I want to write. What do you think? Review and tell me!**

**I do not own the Hunger Games trilogy or its characters, sadly.**

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><p><strong>Amelia Trevitt<strong>

It is much too cold to be wearing what I'm wearing. I nervously rub the small bumps that rise on my bare arms. My short, laced reaping dress barely comes to my knees and looks completely out of place among the bundled up people surrounding me, but it was the only pretty thing I had and I think it will remind him of home.

When Haymitch steps out of the train, the flooded streets erupt in loud cheers and howls and I am pushed forward. He pulls me into a tight hug amidst thousands of bright flashes. I should be happy, but I'm not. Nothing's the way it should be. He's different. His arms grip me harder, wishing things to be the way they used to. And I realize that I am different too as I hold on just as tightly, hoping for the same.

We hold a large party in Haymitch's cramped living room. A final farewell to his old life. I flinch when he picks up a knife to cut the bread and pretend that I don't notice his brother hiding behind me.

Later, on the small porch outside, he tells me that he's rich now. That he can buy me all the pretty things I deserve. That everything is better. He's wrong, of course; there's nothing pretty left here, not on this porch, not in District 12, not anywhere. Maybe there never truly was. But I smile and tell him that I'd like that because I know that's what he needs right now, what we both need.


End file.
